on Leadership & Career

A listing in reverse chronological order of articles by:

Katie Switzer — Advanced Engineering Culture series
Ash Norton — Engineering Leadership series
Tim Rodgers — Managing in the 2000s series
Rob Allen — Product Development and Process Improvement series

What does it mean to Engineer with Impact?

If you’ve hung around this site, subscribed to the email list, or followed me on social media, you know that I am obsessed with engineering impact. It is how I close every email and is the focus of nearly every article and post. Heck, my tagline is Engineer with Impact. But what does that really mean? And how do we know if we are doing it?

As engineers, we pride ourselves on the ability to problem-solve. And rightfully so. We are dang good at it! We’ve spent years, if not decades of our lives, honing the craft of working through problem after problem, getting a precise solution. But sometimes we get so focused on solving the problem in front of us that we don’t stop to think if the problem is really…well…the problem. And when we fail to solve the right problems, we fail to Engineer with Impact. [Read more…]

by Robert Allen Leave a Comment

The Definition of Done

In my previous article, we reviewed the project approval committee, and emphasized approval to start projects and/or approve projects in-process.

With any type of project oversight, presentations or project schedules are often reviewed.

For a more lean project management approach it would help to consider reviewing the actual deliverables, including a mutual understanding of the “definition of done”.

“Definition of done” is the agreed-upon evidence of completion of a process, activity or milestone and usually includes a project deliverable. Some examples of deliverables might include the project plan, project schedule, documents (requirements document, plans, and reports), analysis, and designs (drawings). Other considerations can be built-into “definition of done” including compliance, acceptance/sign-off, exceptions and best practices.

[Read more…]

by Ash Norton Leave a Comment

Priority Setting for Engineers

Setting Priorities – What is your water?

Last year, I had the opportunity to hear Kat Cole, Group President of FOCUS Brands at the time, speak on leadership and the power of setting priorities. Cole shared with us her experiences on a service trip in Africa, in hopes of helping nearby villages with humanitarian efforts, and what it taught her about setting priorities. In this article, I will recount her experience and provide step-by-step guidance for how you can apply it to your work as an engineer.

Sound good? Good – let’s get to it! [Read more…]

by Robert Allen Leave a Comment

The Project Approval Committee

A project approval committee can be an effective way to enable business decision-making and ensure projects are successful.

Committees may be known as a project review or steering committee; however, consider the following (proposed) objectives as follows:

Approve new projects (and project resources)
Approve project phase (phase gate) completion
Approve project go-forward plans (including resources)
Cancel projects that no longer make business sense
Prevent rogue/unapproved projects from consuming resources
Direct / redirect projects to complete key tasks or deliverables before moving forward
Enforce project management planning and execution

[Read more…]

by Ash Norton Leave a Comment

Cardboard and Duct Tape: Lessons in Engineering, Leadership and Life

As part of the 35th Anniversary of the Governor’s Scholars Program in Kentucky, I was invited to participate in their Alumni Day at Northern Kentucky University. So naturally, I shared with this year’s Scholars what my experience taught me about engineering leadership and life!

Below are the slides and lessons learned that I shared. [Read more…]

by Robert Allen Leave a Comment

Statement of Work Fundamentals

In my last article, we reviewed a proposed Product Life Cycle process, which starts with a “Define” phase. In the “Define” phase, we are defining the project as well as the product.

We previously discussed the ‘technical leg’ of this process with the market analysis, identifying customer needs, product requirements, verification and validation, etc. [Read more…]

by Robert Allen Leave a Comment

A Proposed Product Life Cycle Process

In my previous article we covered the advantages of a phase and gate structure for new product development. Now we can discuss some proposed phase names for a new product development or product life cycle (PLC) process.

An organization may have an existing PLC process ‘baked-in’ to their culture and process documentation. Accordingly, there’s a wide range of PLC phase names, all of which are likely acceptable and based on solid reasoning.

[Read more…]

by Ash Norton Leave a Comment

Are You an Indispensable Engineer?

#AskAsh – 004 – How to become an Indispensable Engineer

Question

Hi Ash,

What are your best tips for safeguarding your job, but also rise to the top to score your dream position?

As a recent graduate, I have this fear that if the economy turns or my company starts doing poorly that I’ll be the first one cut. What can you do to be indispensable at work?

Thanks,

Erica, New York

[Read more…]

by Robert Allen Leave a Comment

Phase and Gate Structure for New Product Development

In previous articles we defined an element of lean as a phase and gate structure for new product development. This assumes a waterfall approach to the project (versus agile product development).

A new product life cycle phase gate structure might entail, for example: “Definition, Concept, Design, Verification, Qualification, Production and End-of-Life”. (Your organization might decide on different phase names.)

There’s an apparent contradiction in using a waterfall project approach and calling it lean project management, however. A goal of any lean process is to work toward ‘single piece’ or continuous flow: agile product development is more like ‘single piece flow’ of information, versus waterfall which is more like ‘batch processing’ of information.

[Read more…]

by Robert Allen Leave a Comment

Lean Project Management for Product Development

My last article covered a scalable model for lean product development depending on the number of projects and technical objectives.

Let’s start with the foundational elements from this model:

Facilitate a lean project
Understand customer needs (requirements validation and/or agile product development)
Maximize customer (product) value (product value estimation)

[Read more…]

by Ash Norton Leave a Comment

What is the Best Approach to Negotiating Salary?

#AskAsh – 003 – How to Confidently Enter a Job Offer Negotiation?

In this article, I answer one engineer’s questions regarding how to squash his nerves with a job offer negotiation. His question specifically asks about salary negotiation. However, as you’ll read in tip #6 below, it is better to focus on the whole package and consider other aspects of the offer that might be more important to you. [Read more…]

by Ash Norton 2 Comments

Engineering Manager – The Sasquatch of Leadership?

“[They] aren’t just hard to find — they don’t exist”

Think this was written about the elusive Sasquatch? Loch Ness monster, maybe? What about the abominable snowman?

Nope, nope, and nope. This was referring to good engineering managers.

In his opinion piece, Juan Pablo Dellarroquelle argues that engineers that are good at their jobs have little incentive to move into a managerial role because they are already influential leaders in an individual contributor role.

Alternatively, he argues, engineers who are weak technically are promoted to managers because of their organizational skills.

While this may be the case in some circumstances, in general – I disagree. [Read more…]

by Robert Allen Leave a Comment

A Scalable Model for Lean Product Development

In my previous article we established the lean product development goal statement as:

Develop products that maximize customer value and minimize product cost, in the least amount of time, and at the least amount of product development cost.

We then derived high-level objectives as follows:

Better understand the customer (maximize customer value)
Do the right projects (product, project and portfolio value analysis)
Do projects right (minimize redesigns, waste and rework)
Level load the organization (minimize bottlenecks and resource constraints)
Create and re-use artifacts (standardize and sustain best practices)

These might be considered “enterprise” level objectives…some or all of the objectives might be part of a product development organizational strategy depending on type and/or quantity of development projects.

Let us start by listing lean objectives based the quantity of product development projects:

More projects generally require more governance and management, including managing resources across projects.

Several elements of lean are apparent:

reduce work-effort on the wrong projects
eliminate rogue projects
cancel projects that no longer make business sense
reduce bottlenecks by effectively managing resources
enforce or encourage process discipline

Note an element of ‘slowing-down-to-go-faster’ here….investing work-effort into project governance to achieve significant savings, and enable more valuable projects to be completed faster.

A tailored approach would also consider the type of product development project. A project goal might be to demonstrate a minimum viable product (perhaps a start-up company) or pursue complete product commercialization (manufacturing company).

The graphic below provides some suggested lean product development objectives and initiatives accordingly.

A development process, with the ultimate goal of product commercialization, might place more emphasis on reducing design risk, design optimization & manufacturability. Elements of lean enable the technical process by which customer value is maximized and product cost is minimized.

This brings us to our final category of enabling lean: making good business decisions. Investing in a product or project is ultimately a business decision that can be improved with financial estimating and analysis. Here again we consider the type of product development project, and emphasize customer value, product cost and project cost.

A business decision priority for demonstrating a minimum viable product might include (as a minimum) ensuring corresponding value to the customer. Meanwhile, a more comprehensive financial analysis is more appropriate for many (or larger) projects going through complete commercialization.

Lean product development approaches are scalable based on several factors; a company may perform some project retrospectives, perform an internal survey or assessment, or begin with some awareness of tools and methodologies. ….do you have too many projects? projects that weren’t ultimately successful? resource constraints? high risk of design rework? sub-optimized designs? inadequate product margins? difficult-to-manufacture products?

The most effective and beneficial elements of lean enterprise product development could be down-selected. Even without much project history, risk can be significantly reduced by starting with the basic elements of lean product development. There are likely many opportunities to streamline your product development process. Contact Rob Allen in the form below for additional information or an initial consultation.

by Robert Allen Leave a Comment

What is Lean Product Development (Part III)

In my previous article, we established some high-level objectives for lean product development as follows:

Better understand the customer (maximize customer value)
Do the right projects (product, project and portfolio value analysis)
Do projects right (minimize waste and rework)
Level load the organization (minimize bottlenecks and resource constraints)
Create and re-use artifacts (standardize and sustain best practices)

[Read more…]

by Ash Norton Leave a Comment

Should I get my Professional Engineer License?

#AskAsh-002 – Should I get my Professional Engineer License?

Question:

Hi Ash,

Several managers at my company have told me they think I should pursue getting my Professional Engineer license. While I am not opposed to getting it, I am just not sure it will be worth it.

What do you think?

Thanks,

-Anonymous, Cincinnati, OH

[Read more…]